At it again

Krugman wrote a very good explanation for laymen about his belief that increasing government spending now would be a good idea. I disagree with it, but that's not the point of this post. In the first two paragraphs of the column, Mr. Krugman would have you believe that President Hoover cut government spending, which made the Great Depression worse. He very carefully doesn't say this, but anyone who doesn't know the facts would come away from reading the column thinking that was what happened. Though obviously not on a level with them, this is a lie worthy of the lies the Bush administration told to get us to invade Iraq, where they didn't exactly say lies, but where uninformed listeners/readers would come away thinking falsehoods. For the record, government spending from 1929-1933 (just prior to the Great Depression through FDR's first term) was $3.8bn, $4bn, $4.1bn, $4.3bn, and $5.1bn. Not huge increases, but clear ones, especially in light of the deflationary environment.

A Surge of Knowledge

Want to have a far better understanding of what's happened in Iraq over the last few years than at least 90% of us? I recommend this piece. Great stuff, and not too long or hard to read.

Correcting and Helping Herr Doktor

Krugman tells us that the line that "there are no libertarians in a foxhole" came from this July post by Jeff Frankel. No disrespect to Mr. Frankel, but I used a similar line back in March (by the way, I stand by that post). I'm not sure if I came up with this on my own or if I saw it elsewhere first, but I can say with certainty that Mr. Krugman is wrong.

In another post Mr. Krugman talks about the problem of negative inflation expectations. I agree that this is/would be a problem. There is a fairly simply solution to it though: have the Fed explicitly target the price of gold, say at $1000 per ounce. I'd prefer a lower number, but I also like powers of 10, and the number should be higher than where gold is now. Doing so would let market participants know that inflation is on the way, while credibly signalling that very long-run prices will be fairly stable.

Regulators, Mount up

Excellent piece in Reason about GWB's regulatory tendencies (via Balko). Perception, meet reality. Reality, this is perception.

Dilbert in Real Life

Some great Dilbert's boss-esque quotes from real live bosses. I think my favorite is "This project is so important we can't let things that are more important interfere with it".

The perils of scheming

Great CL story about a woman trying to trap a guy with 'his' kid. Be careful out there guys.

For kicks

Some fun drawings for your Sunday evening looking at pleasure.

Happy Repeal Day

Today is the 75th anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition in the US. Drink up.

This is Rickey, calling on behalf of Rickey

In honor of Rickey Henderson being a new candidate for the Hall of Fame, enjoy these 25 Rickey stories. Too bad, though, learning that the Olerud story is, in fact, not a fact.